Note: I didn’t write this story. It’s very old. But I like it and I’ve decided to recite it, with a little editing, for your enjoyment.
As long ago and as far away as your great-grandmothers cradle, there lived a husband and wife who loved each other very much.
One day the woman fell mortally ill. She told her husband that she would forsake the afterlife to stay with him in this world, as a ghost. He urged her not to, but this made her believe that he had already begun to forget her. “I will remain as a ghost, and I will watch over you. But if you forget me, I will be angry and cause much mischief in your life,” she told him, with tears in her eyes.
The woman soon died. The man mourned deeply, but in the fullness of time his life returned to normal. Sometimes he indeed felt as if the spirit of his lost wife was watching over him, but these times grew less and less frequent.
Eventually the man met another woman. They became friends, then realized that they were in love, and became engaged.
The night after the engagement, the ghost of the dead wife appeared to the man and accused him of being unfaithful. She had been watching over him constantly, she said, and had become furious when he became engaged. She criticized every detail of his courtship with his new fiance. She knew everything; every little detail of every private moment and conversation they had shared. The man was devastated.
The ghost continued to reappear over the course of the next several nights, until finally the man was desperate. He had not been able to sleep for days, because it was when he was alone at night that the ghost would appear.
The man consulted with a local sage, and told him the entire story.
The sage was particularly impressed with the knowledge demonstrated by the ghost. It was clear that she followed the man everywhere and remembered even the slightest details that could be used in her nightly tirades.
“Come back tomorrow, and tell me how your evening goes tonight. I think I know how to make the ghost leave you in peace, but it will take some time to prepare,” the sage told the man.
That night, the ghost came to the man again. She told him that she had been watching when he visited the sage, had heard what the sage had told him, and was not worried. She told him that there was nothing the sage could do that would make her leave. She had no fear of the sage, and was amused by his strange mannerisms and affectations, which she recounted and mocked in detail.
The next morning, the man returned to the sage and, with some embarrassment, told him everything that the ghost had said.
“I do believe that the ghost follows you everywhere, even when you visit me,” said the sage, “and her attention to detail and her recall are extraordinary! But nevertheless, I do not think that I will have any trouble with her, and soon you will both have peace.”
The sage explained his plan. He would give the man a special box containing two compartments. In the inner compartment, he would place a small number of magic pebbles, and in the outer compartment, he would write out instructions for how to use the magic pebbles when the ghost appeared. Because the magic in the pebbles would only be potent for a very short time once the box was opened, it was crucial that the man not open the inner compartment of the box until the ghost appeared.
The sage showed him the empty box, and how to open it, and then asked the man to wait for a moment while he went to the storeroom where the magic pebbles were stored, and to write out the instructions.
“But wait,” interjected the man. “She is undoubtedly here right now, looking over our shoulders. She will know about the box, and she will know about the pebbles. She will have all day to prepare a counter for them. How do you know that they will still work?”
The sage smiled and assured the man that the magic would work anyway, and then he excused himself and went to the storeroom. In a few minutes, he returned with the box. The box now rattled.
That night, the ghost appeared again, and began her tirade. She told him that she had seen the magic pebbles, and they were nothing she need to fear. She had also seen the instructions that the sage had written, and they were useless. His heart sank, but he resolved to try anyway.
He opened the outer compartment, pulled out the instructions, and began to read.
“The ghost has probably told you that she has seen the pebbles and these instructions,” he read. “If not, please ask her about them. I am sure that she watched me put them in the box, and will say that their magic has no power over her.” The man already knew this to be true, so he continued reading.
“After she has told you that she watched me put the pebbles in the box, ask her how many pebbles I put in the box.”
“How many pebbles are in the box?” asked the man, to an empty, silent room. The ghost had vanished.
The man never saw the ghost again, although sometimes he thought he could still feel the spirit of his first wife, watching over him, at peace.
